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What a journey it has been! We have been back for about a week now and now that people are recovering from their jetlags and long walks, it is time to reflect back on what has been an amazing Studytour.
When we left for Japan on the morning of the 12th of April, nobody really knew what to expect. None of us had ever been there. However, when we arrived, it was better than all of us could have expected. The Japanese people have been so friendly to us, public transportation was very organized and the country itself was just beautiful. Time was flying while we were traveling from Kyoto to Osaka to Hiroshima and finally to Tokyo, whilst also stopping at Nara and Nagoya. Before we knew it, we had to go back to Haneda International Airport for the flight back to Schiphol Airport on the 2nd of May.

However, between those two flights, we have done an awful lot of things. We have visited over twelve companies, universities, and institutes, we visited the Dutch Embassy in Tokyo, we have climbed the Umeda Sky Building and the Tokyo Skytree, we have visited Mt Fuji, we visited temples, castles, and parks and so much more. We have traveled nearly 2000 km with the bullet trains (Shinkansen) and we have used more metros, trains, and busses than we can count.

There have been days in which everyone had to put their pride aside and walk around 20 km in a single day if we wanted to visit the highest peak with a beautiful view over Miyajima Island, and there have been days when nothing was scheduled and most of the participants went to a nearby park and enjoyed the amazing weather or visited the city center with a small group.

We have had long nights and early mornings, we have had formal occasions to prestigious universities and we have had informal downtown areas of the different cities that we visited. We have done everything that we could possibly plan in a 20 day period. We have had an amazing experience, one that not many participants will ever forget.

We would like to thank everyone who has made this possible. We want to thank the participants, the academic staff that joined, the sponsors and all of the companies and universities that welcomed us with open arms every single time! Arigato!

Photos and reports per day will be uploaded very soon so that everyone can read and see what we have experienced during the Studytour 2018 to Japan!

On Wednesday the 21st of February, the participants evening for the studytour was held! During this evening, all the participants of this studytour got together and had an evening filled with activities. First, there was a presentation given by Sander which included everything the participants need to know about the tour. Things such as what universities, companies and cultural highlights will be visited and much more. Also, the participants blouses with the Studytour logo and Thirona logo were presented by Jelle and Steffie. After the presentation, there was time for a toast, or ‘’Kanpai’’, with saké. What followed was a pubquiz with questions about Japan. It was a tense battle between Mick and Elke but in the end, Elke was the winner and took home the amazing sushi starter kit as a reward!

After that, it was time for some fun and games. The group was split up in three smaller groups and they were divided to either get a taste of traditional Japanese beer, Asahi, at the bar, play with origami or try to eat Japanese crackers with chopsticks.

Of course, no evening in the theme of Japan is complete without sushi! The committee tried its very best to make the best sushi the participants had ever eaten!

As a closing activity, we had a lot of fun doing karaoke! The committee initiated the karaoke by singing I Want It That Way from the Backstreet Boys, but soon we were all blown away by Roy’s excellent cover of Dancing Queen by Abba. We also got to enjoy Bohemian Rhapsody by Gino and Stijn and many more. We were also gifted with the marvelous low voices of Roel and the actually amazing voice of Yi He!

In the end we had a very fun evening and we hope every participant shared this feeling as well! We are very much looking forward to this Studytour!

The participants evening will be held on Wednesday, February the 21st in In Vivo. During this activity, all of the participants of this studytour will get to know each other a little bit more before the trip and information about the trip itself will be given. This will include information about the flights, the schedules per day and more. Also, the participants clothing will be provided during this evening. We hope to see you all there!

We are very pleased to inform you all that Stichting Protagoras has decided, during a meeting between Stip and the committee on the 27th of November, that the trip is allowed to happen and we have therefore received the green light! This means that the committee will now start working on realizing this trip and finalizing the academic activities that we have been working on for the past couple of weeks. This list will be updated very soon!

The location of the studytour 2018 of SvBMT Protagoras is known! The trip will go to the beautiful country of… Japan! In this country, we will visit several cities, including Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka, and visit multiple universities and companies. Besides this, we will also visit some of the nature that Japan is known for. This trip will take place from April 12th until May 3rd.

This is the site of the Study Tour 2018 for Biomedical engineering students of the Eindhoven University of Technology! Here you will find the information about the study tour itself, its committee and its sponsors.